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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29177484">icarus and all his secrets</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/requin_renard/pseuds/requin_renard'>requin_renard</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Tintin - All Media Types</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Emotional Baggage, Established Relationship, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Implied Sexual Content, Implied/Referenced Sex, Insecurity, M/M, References to Ancient Greek Religion &amp; Lore, haddock will wait for him, poor baby isn't sure why people should care about him, tchang is an agony aunt, tintin doesn't know how to open up</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-02-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-02-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 00:23:03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,047</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29177484</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/requin_renard/pseuds/requin_renard</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>"He is troubled, deep down, and that is why he runs from himself. But if you love him, and give him space when he desires, he will unfurl in your hands,” Tchang spread out his hands like a pale lotus in front of him. “Just like a flower; he needs patience and care. I know that you will give him what he needs, because you adore him.”</p><p>Tintin struggles to open up about himself now Haddock has become more than a friend. Haddock will wait for his Icarus to come back to Earth. Poetic reflections.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Archibald Haddock/Tintin</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>26</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>icarus and all his secrets</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">


        <li>
            Inspired by

            <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28654905">silly boys, no one needs to hear your words</a> by <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/kivancalcite/pseuds/kivancalcite">kivancalcite</a>.
        </li>

    </ul><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>i finished 'the song of achilles' a while ago and i can never not love a good greek mythology reference aha. kinda inspired by kivancalcite's chapter 4, bc it prompted me to go back n listen to 'icarus' by bastille on repeat and,., honestly go listen, i think the lyrics are pretty applicable to these two:</p><p>'standing on the cliff face<br/>highest foe you'll ever grace<br/>it scares me half to death'</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Tintin was an Icarus; from the moment he’d met him, he knew the boy would always be only six degrees from danger.<br/><br/>He was glowing, warm, ambitious. He filled rooms with his winning smile, made friends from the most aged and wizened of men and tugged out threads of trust and laughter from anyone who spent longer than a moment with him. He was strong, not in an overly muscular way, but in the way a body becomes when it was honed to be alert and constantly reacting to what was happening around it. He was always desperate to seek out the next lead, to find the latest clue buried out in the darkness.<br/>He only ever seemed to sit still in photographs.<br/>He resembled the sun, a classical hero, with his unyielding warmth and smiles and boundless energy. Haddock often felt the room become lighter the second he came in; suddenly his chest felt looser, the drink in his hand became less appealing. He’d find himself shaken from the darkest of moods by a gentle click of a tongue and a voice saying softly ‘Now come on, C<em>apitane</em>, what’s bothering you?’</p><p>He could handle a gun, a motorbike, was competent in radio communications. He’d been around the world a dozen times and to the moon and back. He never missed an article and always took the time to greet a fan on a Brussels street corner. Haddock often wondered how much goodness could be contained within one man’s flesh. He was nothing but vitality and hot youthful blood. The measured diplomat and the hot headed defendant at once.</p><p>But he was an Icarus, and Haddock knew it. He’d seen the times he’d fallen.</p><p>The fretful weeks spent at his bedside in Syldavia as the boy recovered from the bullet in his head. He’d seen the silvery scars that covered his arms, legs, the second bullet wound in his shoulder, firstly when they changed and bathed in the many days they’d spent together camping and as prisoners, secondly when his rough hands traced the delicate freckled skin in the small hours of passionate nights.</p><p>He’d been sat once, agitatedly waiting for him to arrive home from chasing up a lead down by the docks. Haddock had heard him protesting in the corridor against Nestor’s fussing and then the boy had emerged sheepishly into the drawing room with a badly disguised limp. His lip was split and he held his hand rather too tightly to his ribs. Haddock had risen up quickly and steered him towards the sofa.</p><p>“What in God’s name have you got into?” he had murmured, voice low and urgent. The boy had simply brushed him off with an abashed smile and told him vaguely of an altercation with a gang of thugs.</p><p>“It’s fine, I just miscalculated how many would be there,” he’d said, wincing slightly as Haddock fussed around him on the sofa. “Just a bit of a bruise, that’s all.”</p><p>Haddock had stood stony faced at the foot of the bed the next morning when the doctor had been called to bandage up the cracked ribs the boy had hidden from him. It took him being unable to rise from bed before he would admit perhaps something was awry. It was if something inside wouldn’t let him admit to vulnerability – he would sooner suffer in silence than let Haddock know he was hurting.</p><p>And that was Before; before they’d both realised the things that simmered deep down in the pits of themselves. Now there was another layer of complications, where he fussed for him as a lover as well as a dear friend. The boy seemed to take this development as another reason to further hide his afflictions from Haddock.</p><p>Tintin never made things easy for him. He was so often a closed book.<br/>Haddock knew he must have histories, things that Tintin would rather leave unsaid. Anyone who had seen and done so much with so little years behind them must have some turbulence deep down inside. He had never pressed the younger man, never tried to wheedle some truths out of him. But the curiosity lingered like an itch begging to be scratched.</p><p>Sometimes Tintin would shrink away from the post-coital embrace, the pillow talk, seemingly unable to cope with the intensity of what they had just done. He would pull his underwear back on and sit in his unbuttoned nightshirt on the floor, looking out of the window and across the moonlit Moulinsart lawns. Sometimes Haddock would lean on his elbow and stare silently at his pale skin, the purple marks of lust that bloomed upon him amongst his scars and simply wait for him to return. Other times, he would sigh, guiltily irate, turn away from him and attempt to get some sleep.<br/>On the worst nights, Tintin would leave the bedroom altogether, wordlessly, only to slip back into the warm sheets hours later, as cold as a ghost, whisper something cryptic and then nuzzle into the heat of the other’s body.</p><p><br/>He was such an unreadable enigma it baffled Haddock beyond words. Tintin was like a wild animal to be tamed; with every two skittish steps he took towards opening up, he would seemingly out of nowhere, clam up and withdraw into himself. It could sometimes take weeks for the sailor to coax him to return to a place of mutual comfort between them, where the boy could share parts of himself without bolting and Haddock could feel they were on an equal playing field. He feared he had become the new sun – something so excitingly enticing but dangerous. When Tintin plummeted away from him, from his embrace, he could not catch him at the bottom. He could only wait for him to try and fly towards him again.</p><p>The younger man’s spells of reticence had even prompted Haddock to confide in Tchang.<br/>It had been a summer evening, where the Chinese boy had come to stay for a fortnight. The three of them were sitting in the drawing room, laughing companionably and enjoying each other's presence. Tintin stood up, stretching.</p><p>“I’m just going to let Milou out for a moment so he can have one last romp around the grounds before bed,” he announced. “I shan’t be long.” As he passed, he reached to brush a hand against Haddock’s shoulder who returned a brief smile. He waited until the door had clicked shut behind them before Haddock leaned forward in his chair. Tchang crossed his legs, looking meditative.</p><p>“Something is bothering you,” he said. “What is it?”</p><p>“It’s Tintin,” Haddock said in a low voice. “I know he’s always been a bit… you know,” he made a vague gesture, signalling <em>reserved</em>, to which Tchang nodded, seemingly understanding. “I just wish he wasn’t such a blasted mystery to me all the time. Does… does he tell <em>you</em> things? In his letters?”</p><p>“How do you mean?”</p><p>“Well, does he open up to you? Sometimes I feel like he’s harder to read than thundering hieroglyphics. He’s so hot, then so cold, like he can’t decide if he wants to settle down or flee at a moment’s notice.” Haddock blustered.</p><p>“Tintin <em>is </em>a very difficult person to read,” Tchang said after a moment. “He is hard to pin down and define. He lives his life riding on the coattails of fate and opportunity; he is not used to permanency. You must give him time.”</p><p>“It just confuses and frustrates me,” Haddock muttered. “I mean, thundering typhoons, he must trust me by now, surely...” he rubbed a hand over his face.</p><p>Tchang gave him a small smile. “Oh, he does trust you. He loves you dearly; he has told me that. It is no reflection on you, Captain. He is troubled, deep down, and that is why he runs from himself. But if you love him, and give him space when he desires, he will unfurl in your hands,” Tchang spread out his hands like a pale lotus in front of him. “Just like a flower; he needs patience and care. I know that you will give him what he needs, because you adore him.”</p><p>Haddock stared at the other’s open palms, brow furrowed pensively. He started back as the door swung open again and Tintin re-entered with Milou tucked under his arm, whistling cheerfully.</p><p>“You look thoughtful, Captain,” he remarked brightly. “Did I miss something interesting?”</p><p>Tchang smiled and shook his head, “No, not at all. I was just telling our Captain of a rare, beautiful flower I know of.” he folded his hands back into his lap and moved, allowing the other to sit down beside him again. The conversation started up again quickly, the three of them speaking with ease of far less serious things. Tchang caught Haddock’s thoughtful gaze and winked. Haddock returned it with a soft smile.</p><p>-</p><p>The small figure was sitting by the window again, his shoulders hunched up defensively and knees drawn up to his chest. Lit by the pale moon, he looked ghostlike – a white spectre at the foot of their bed. Haddock pushed back the covers and rose. He pulled his thick housecoat around him and grabbed the woollen throw from the corner before crossing the room to the pensive figure at the window. He gently draped the blanket over Tintin’s shoulders and, with a laboured groan, sat down beside him. He reached to take his hand and squeezed it in his lap.</p><p>“Talk to me,” he said, voice husky. It felt so strange, to feel so cut off from the person he had just explored every physical inch of. He knew his body inside out, every freckle, birthmark, every graze. But here he was, once again locked out of the other’s thoughts, barely ten minutes since they’d been a patchwork of flushed skin and sweat. “You make me feel like a stranger.”<br/>Tintin sighed softly, saying nothing.</p><p>“Does it embarrass you?” Haddock ventured. “Us? Being like this?”</p><p>The younger man turned suddenly and shook his head.<br/>“Never,” he said quickly. He seized the other’s hands in his own. “Captain, you are the greatest thing I have ever found and I love you with all my heart. I could never feel embarrassed of us.”</p><p>Captain; Haddock couldn’t help but smile.<br/>It was as if he lived two different lives – he was Captain. That was he. It was only in the flurry of bed clothes where his true name, his real name would be softly whined against his ear, the skin of his neck, mixed in amongst feverish French mutterings. He felt almost distanced from his aggressively English first name now, for it was only in those pockets of sensuality that it was ever heard. He was Captain Haddock to the world now, Archibald scarcely existed. Haddock chased villains around the world, Archibald pinned pretty boys to mattresses and made them forget their own names.</p><p>“Then why do you get like this?” Haddock asked gently. He was wary of Tchang, <em>give him space when he desires, he will unfurl in your hands,</em> but his need for closure pushed him further. “What is it that bothers you so much? I care so much for you, lad, won’t you share a bit of your burden with an old soak?” Tintin was silent for a moment. He exhaled shakily.</p><p>“Because I am afraid that it’s all too good to be true,” he said quietly. “I’ve never had so much in all my life. It all feels like it must be a wonderful dream that’s going to shatter right before me. I suppose I distance myself from you, before you get a chance to distance yourself from me.”</p><p>Haddock was shocked into silence. He looked at the young man in front of him.</p><p>“Blistering barnacles, don’t talk such rubbish,” he said in a low voice. “I would never, ever, abandon you.” They looked at each other fiercely. “Do you hear me? Do you think after trailing after you round the world and over again that I would abandon you just like that?” Tintin remained mute. Haddock grabbed his shoulders, their faces mirror images. “I don’t want to hear you say anything like that again, I mean it. Don’t say such nonsense.”</p><p>Tintin gazed at him, almost looking mystified.</p><p>“Is this what it’s all been about? The bouts of emotional distance, the pulling away from me?” Haddock pressed. Tintin nodded.</p><p>“I didn’t want to let myself get used to it, or give too much. I’m just so terrified of losing it all. I’ve never <em>had</em> anything to lose before.”</p><p>Haddock suddenly grabbed his hand and pressed it against the warm skin of his bare chest. His heart was thumping. He would let the boy reach through his skin and rip it from him if he so desired.</p><p>“Do you feel that?” he asked. Tintin nodded hesitantly, fingers curling into the swirls of dark hair. “That’s a sailor’s heartbeat, pumping brine not blood. I swear by Neptune’s beard that I will be here, day in and day out, just as surely as the tides come and go twice a day. Do you understand me?” The boy nodded, his facial expression intense and unreadable.</p><p>Tintin could see him now, his Achilles. He was the greatest warrior, not just in his broad shouldered gait, still so tightly muscled beneath those sagging woollen sweaters, but in his resoluteness; though he moaned and griped, he would never back down or change his mind. He would clap him on the shoulder and look him squarely in the eye and say <em>“You lead on, lad. I trust you.”</em> which would leave Tintin glowing pink.</p><p>How many times had they faced calamity together? And yet he they both still were. He was his constant, as blistering and fierce as the storms he had sailed through and as dependable as the salt water he lived on. As much as his own insecurities tried to tell him otherwise, he knew the other would never dry up, or disappear. He would simply wait, ever patient. Ever long-suffering.</p><p>“Do you promise me?” Tintin breathed, his nostrils quivering. Haddock nodded his head slowly.</p><p>“I give you my word,” he said quietly. “Do <em>you </em>promise you’ll let me in? I can't stand being a stranger to you.”</p><p>Wordlessly, Tintin nodded and moved closer to him, closing the gap between them. He could smell the sweet tobacco and crisp sea salt that seemed forever stuck in the gaps between his skin and bone, the scent warming the pit of his stomach.</p><p>Haddock’s stomach flipped as he saw the intensity in the other’s eyes cloud to a darkness. He felt chilled small hands slip from his chest and move downwards. He held back a groan.</p><p>“I want to be more familiar than your own skin.” Tintin breathed against his ear. Haddock closed his eyes and leant backwards.</p><p>-</p><p>“I’m an orphan,” he’d said suddenly. “Though I'm sure you already guessed that.” They were laid in bed, the covers thick about them, bodies pressed flush together. The pinkness of lovemaking was still in his cheeks. Haddock gently traced his fingers round his ear and hummed.</p><p>“You don’t have to tell me this, you know, if you don’t want to,” he replied softly. The boy shook his head and rolled over to face him.</p><p>“No, no. I want to share things with you...” his eyes flitted away for a moment. “I’ve never told anyone of this before. I mean, I’m sure people know, but I suppose they must just work it out...”</p><p>Haddock had sighed, pulling him close for a moment. “I have always wondered,” he admitted. “It worried me, in the old days, thinking about you going back to that pokey flat, just you and Milou. You were barely a child.”</p><p>“I could look after myself!” he jabbed the other playfully in the ribs. “But I’m not complaining now. It’s quite nice to be fussed over,” Tintin inhaled deeply, looking thoughtful. He opened his mouth a few times before he seemingly committed. “My mother was called Clara,” he began. “She was very small and very slight and very red-headed. At least, that’s what they told me.”</p><p>Haddock chuckled warmly. This was progress, good progress.<br/>“Well, that’s unsurprising,” he said, fingers gently playing with the other’s hair. “I’m sure you’re a spit. What about your father?” <em>Tentative, easy, you old dog,</em> <em>don't push him.<br/></em>Tintin blushed slightly, looking awkward.<br/>“He was stocky, but not particularly tall either. And apparently he had a very pronounced beard that he painstakingly groomed for most of his adult life...” He looked to the captain who wore an amused expression. “Perhaps don’t think about that too much...it rather complicates things, doesn’t it?”<br/>Haddock laughed again, scratching at his chin</p><p>“Oh, Freud was a crazy old bat,” he said sagely. “Don’t take any notice of that cobblers.” Tintin smiled shyly. “Where did you grow up, then?” Haddock prompted, careful not to tug too tightly on the life lines the boy was hesitantly handing to him.<br/>“Clara had a sister who was a nun,” he replied. “And so when they died, she agreed to take me in at the nunnery and raise me. There was a handful of us that grew up there. They taught us best they could, kept us clothed and fed.”</p><p>“You can’t have had much to call your own?” Haddock asked. Tintin shrugged slightly.</p><p>“I had enough, to be content...” he lapsed off, a faraway look coming into his eyes. Haddock, fearing he was nearing another nervous revolt, said nothing. He simply stroked the side of his head looking at him thoughtfully.</p><p>“I was happy there,” Tintin said after a moment with a note of finality. “I have always had a knack of making a family amongst strangers.”</p><p>Then he turned and slipped into the space between Haddock’s broad arms, his face flush with the others chest. Realising that they had  reached Tintin’s threshold for sharing that night, Haddock cherished the small secret the other had entrusted to him. He didn’t ask any more, simply holding this secret in his hands like a precious jewel and gently kissed his lover on the brow.</p><p><br/>He could almost see the sun shining through the small chink in the boy’s armour.</p><p> </p><p> </p>
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